 Maree
Coote is a Melbourne writer and designer, photographer
and illustrator who has long held a passion for her
home city, and who has been photographing the city
and writing on Melbourne's history for over 10 years.
Her recent creative exploits include a series of over
50 artworks reinventing Australia's sexiest bushranger
Ned Kelly, and a book of the collection called 50
Neds: Ned Kelly, Icon of Australian Art.
It was during the two and a half year research phase
of her first book (The
Melbourne Book - A History of Now) that Coote was bitten forever with the Kelly
bug and driven to create the 50 Neds series of artworks.
This series is still being developed and extended,
with large canvasses now on exhibit in the melbournestyle
gallery in Clarendon Street South Melboune.
Her first book, The
Melbourne Book - A History of Now - is a modern
chronicle of a unique city. Visual, passionate and
informative, it tells the history of a city and its
style, its people and its vivid past. Crammed with
anecdotes and detail and with over 700 photographs,
The Melbourne Book explores the city with an eye
for the ordinary and the extraordinary. First published
in 2003, it is still going strong, The
Melbourne Book won Commendation - Best Print
- 2004 Victorian State Government History Awards.
Coote
has also illustrated and written 3 children's picture
books, all with Australian themes and a celebration
of local icons and natural attributes. These include
The Black Pot Belly -
a charming and witty piece of nonsense about a magical
pot belly stove whose antics illuminate the charm of
low-tech living, and whose dreams include joining the
Kelly Gang... Unusual and fresh, this very different
tale is a delight. Artwork from Coote's children's
books is now part of the permanent collection of the
Dromkeen Children's Literature Collection. |
